A large number of buildings are built using reinforced concrete shear walls, to provide greater rigidity and resistance to horizontal stresses caused by earthquakes. The great majority of engineers design these shear walls ...[+]

A large number of buildings are built using reinforced concrete shear walls, to provide greater rigidity and resistance to horizontal stresses caused by earthquakes. The great majority of engineers design these shear walls taking into account exclusively the elastic-linear branch of the materials, thus obtaining concrete elements that follows the regulatory requirements, but which may be over-dimensioned.
In this master's thesis, we compare the advantages of the analysis of the shear wall taking into account only its elastic-linear behavior, and designing the shear walls, analyzing its behavior, taking into account the non-linearity of the materials. To make this comparison, several points are considered, which are explained below.
The first point is the structural design of traditions Bolivain reinforced concrete buildings of different heights, taking into account the elastic-linear behavior of the materials. We proceed with the realization of an individual analysis of shear walls, taking as starting data the tensions and f reinforcement bars obtained in the initial design. In this analysis, characteristics of non-linearity of the materials are taken into account, in order to obtain data that resemble the actual behavior of the shear walls more closely.
To conclude, a comparison is made between the data obtained in the first design and the results obtained from the subsequent analysis, thus being able to observe the advantages and disadvantages of a more detailed analysis of reinforced concrete elements. The results obtained will be of great importance, because if it is demonstrated that the elements of shear walls are oversized, it will encourage structural engineers to perform a more extended analysis of these elements, in order to make a more efficient and economic design.[-]